The Lost Daughter of India

by Sharon Maas

  Chapter 35

  Asha

  The Bengali lived in a very big, grand house with many servants. He was not married. I thought that lady had brought me there to marry him but I was wrong. That was not true. Anyway, she did not have the right to find a husband for me. Only Amma has that right but Amma’s soul has left her body. So I was very confused. I was thinking of those films. They filled me with horror.

  The Bengali was an elderly man. He was very thickset and had cheeks that hung down next to his mouth and wobbled as he spoke. He was very rich. I could tell because of the house. There were thick carpets on the floor and everything was golden and shiny. A servant opened the door and another servant led us to him.

  I was wearing a shiny red sari decorated with many sequins, and that lady had spent hours on my hair and face. She had put all kinds of coloured creams on my face and black colours around my eyes. My face felt clogged and stiff. My lips were red with paste. She put jewels in my hair and in my nose and ears and around my neck. I did not feel as if I were myself at all. I was clothed like a princess in a film but I was not a real princess. Just an artificial one, a doll, a human body dressed up to look like royalty, but inside I was just as wretched as before.

  Clothes do not change a person. Just because I was wearing all those shiny red clothes and those jewels and the colours on my lips and eyes, I was not a princess. Inside I was trembling with fear.

  The lady too was dressed up in a shiny sari, stiff like paper, that rustled as she walked, and she wore new chappals, and perfume so strong I thought I would faint.

  The Bengali was horrible. He stared at me with a certain look in his eye. ‘Lovely, lovely,’ he said. ‘Even more beautiful than in her photo. A little too old perhaps but still very lovely.’

  He even spoke to me. ‘You are very beautiful,’ he said. ‘You will be my woman.’

  When he said those words I almost fainted with shock. I cannot describe the terror that coursed through my body. Truly, I would rather have entered a tiger’s cage than to be in that room with the Bengali.

  He stretched out his hand to hold my wrist but I flinched and drew it away. That made him angry.

  ‘What!’ he said. ‘Come! Let me hold you!’

  But now I was trembling all over my body, and shrinking away from him. That made him even more furious. He shouted at me.

  ‘What is this!’ he yelled. He was yelling not at me but at the woman who called herself Devaki Aunty. ‘I thought you said she was trained!’

  ‘I have told her what she is to do,’ said the woman I would not name. ‘She is just being coy. She knows how to behave.’

  ‘I do not like resistance! I want a feminine girl, a loving soft girl who will be good to me! This girl is not even smiling!’

  ‘She can smile beautifully, Mr Chaudhuri,’ said the lady, who was smiling herself and simpering. ‘Show him how you can smile, Kamini!’

  But I did not smile. I could not. My whole body was trembling. I could not help it.

  ‘She is trembling with fear! I do not want a girl who fears me!’

  He was shouting at the lady. His face was red with anger.

  ‘Mr Chaudhuri, little Kamini is an innocent girl. You said you wanted an innocent girl, not a professional. That is why we chose this girl for you. You must understand she is afraid because she is innocent. She is so pure. It is natural for a pure girl to feel fear at first. You must understand that. You must be gentle with her.’

  The Bengali stopped shouting then, calmed by her words.

  ‘Yes, yes, you are right. She is fearful out of innocence and purity. I like purity – that is what will cure me of this disease. But I do not want to rape her. I am not a rapist. I am an honourable man. I want her to come to me with joy. You must train her to do this. Even a pure girl can learn. She is not well trained. You must take her away and train her some more. She must be docile and loving, coming to me with joy in her heart. That is what I want. I give you a week to return this girl with better training. I want her but in a compliant and soft loving way. You said she speaks English. I want her to talk to me in English, sing to me beautiful songs of love, in English. My favourite songs: ‘The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face’, and so on. That is what I want. Otherwise half-price.’

  I did not fully understand what he said. I am only repeating the words, as I remember them. I did not know words like rape and rapist. I wished I had a dictionary, or Janiki to explain. Now I know.

  But I did understand words like loving, and joy. There was no love and no joy in my heart and in my life. I could not give this Bengali what he wanted. But the lady promised me to him, well trained.

  ‘Give me a week,’ she said. ‘I will train her some more. I will talk to Mr Rajgopal.’

  Another word I understood well was half-price. I am not stupid. I understood well that I was to be sold to the Bengali.

  Chapter 36

  Caroline

  By morning’s end Caroline was a walking heap of sweaty exhaustion.

  ‘Seen enough?’ Gita asked, and when she nodded, continued: ‘So, now you know what you’re up against.’ She looked at her watch. ‘It’s eleven thirty. Go back to your hotel and rest; but be sure to come to the team meeting at four. We’ll have a brainstorming session – if you have any ideas on how to move forward, bring them there. See you!’ And she was gone.

  ‘I need a meal and a nap,’ said Caroline to Kamal and Gita. ‘How about you?’ She looked from one to the other.

  ‘I’m going to take a walk,’ said Kamal. ‘I need to think. I’ll see you at the house at about three forty-five, OK?’

  Caroline nodded, disappointed. She had hoped to discuss matters with Kamal over a light lunch, but already he was walking away, melting into the crowds on the Bombay sidewalk.

  ‘And you, Janiki? Are you going back to your hotel? Where is it, anyway? I’m staying at the Taj.’

  Janiki laughed. ‘The Taj is way out of my league,’ she said. ‘I’m at some cheap digs not too far away. But I don’t need a rest. I’m going back to Tulasa House. I want to use the computer.’

  Janiki hailed two rickshaws, one for Caroline and one for herself; her Hindi, she found, was good enough to bargain down Caroline’s taxi fare a little (the Taj, she found, combined with Caroline’s white skin, demanded an inviolate luxury levy) and so they parted company.

  ‘See you later,’ she said, stepping into her own vehicle.

  Sleeping during the day always had the effect on Caroline of a heavy drug, knocking her out for hours. She avoided it in America, but here, in India, in combination with jet-lag and the sleeplessness of the previous night, it was like opium. Fortunately she had set the alarm, and it woke her at two thirty; yet she found she could not get up. The lethargy clung to her like a coarse skin; she lay under the slowly rotating ceiling fan, too lazy even to get up to pour herself a glass of cool water from the flask on the sideboard. The drawn blinds kept out the afternoon sun, and the gloom was like a further narcotic.

  ‘Get up,’ she scolded herself. ‘Take a shower. There are things to be done. A meeting to attend. Asha to be found.’

  And so she forced herself out of the soft lavishness of the bed, into the coolness of the shower where she washed her hair and then dried it with the hotel-provided drier. Thank goodness it was so short, cut for convenience just before her flight to India.

  Looking at her open suitcase, she remembered her resolve to buy a shalwar kameez. She had noticed a boutique down in the hotel foyer; this was a good time to go down and buy herself something. She put on clean trousers and a blouse and made her way down. The boutique attendant was almost obsequious in her desire to sell a matching trio of flowing tunic, wide trousers and shawl, but Caroline could not make up her mind, and eventually left the shop without a purchase. Those suits were all – well, unsuitable, she thought, wincing at her own bad pun. Far too swish, too shiny, too Taj. She needed something simple. Something like what Janiki had worn. Cotton, not silk. She walked out into
the heat of the day, onto the pavement, and hailed a rickshaw. In broken English, and fingering her blouse to demonstrate to the driver, she managed to make her intentions known: Shalwar kameez shop? Sari shop? He bobbled his head and drove off.

  By three thirty Caroline was the proud owner of five brand new simple but pretty shalwar kameezes. Too late to go back to the Taj.

  ‘I’ll wear one now,’ she had told the obsequious shop attendant who had helped her choose. In fact there had been three of them, all male, eager to help her make the right choice, offering her a chair and a cup of tea, which she had gratefully accepted (and when the chai came milked and sugared, she held her breath and drank it all up, because that was the Indian way, the polite way, and she was learning), and bending over backwards to help her choose only the best-quality and most expensive suits. But she had gone with her instincts and chosen for practicality, not for fashion.

  ‘Madam, it is not suitable for wearing right away,’ said the attendant. ‘The fabric is too stiff. You must wash it once before wearing to remove the starch.’

  ‘No, it doesn’t matter if it’s a bit stiff. I have to wear it now. I’ll wear this one: see, the shawl is soft and flowing. I’ll put it back on. Thank you for your help.’

  ‘Thank you, madam, no problem. I will write you a bill; you just take it to the cashier at the front of the shop.’

  As she walked away every one of the attendants in the shop – all male – stood back and made namaste, smiled at her and bid her farewell and thanked her for her custom. Americans, she thought, could take some lessons in customer service from the Indians. Once again she stepped out into the sweltering Bombay heat. It was now three thirty. She might just make it to Tulasa House in time; she certainly wouldn’t make that tentative three-forty-five meeting with Kamal. Once more, time had dropped into a hole and the day was more than half over and Asha was not found.

  Basically, she had wasted a day. Wasted a whole day strolling around Kamathipura like some kind of a celebrity diva and then sleeping and then shopping, all while Asha was still in jeopardy, still not found. And time still seemed to be stretching before her, waiting for her to quicken her pace, get back into the rhythm she had once known, that sense of time constantly on the ebb, constantly running away, taking success and achievement and victory with it; and if she did not run with time all would be lost, for ever. In America, time was something to grab, now, here, before it was too late. In India, time was leisurely and eternal. But it held Asha captive, and that was the problem. She needed to inject a little bit of America into India. This dawdling was not for her. And yet, today, she had subscribed to it completely.

  ‘This won’t do,’ she told herself. ‘I’ve wasted a day and Asha is out there and nobody seems to see the need to make each moment count. We need to change pace. Go full steam ahead. I need to take control. I’ll speak up at that team meeting.’

  Chapter 37

  Asha

  She began to slap me the moment we entered the car. Slap, slap, slap, right cheek, left cheek, right cheek again. And all the time shouting at me for being so stubborn.

  ‘You are a silly, stupid girl!’ she yelled. ‘Do you know what you have done? You have only made matters worse for yourself and for everyone! I told you to be nice to him; that is all you have to do! You are a proud, stupid girl. You think you are so pure but wait and see what happens to stubborn girls! You do not know how lucky you are to be chosen by Mr Chaudhuri! Do you think he takes just any girl? He is very particular and you are so lucky! Do you think he just takes any little girl dragged from Kamathipura? You think so?’

  Well I did not think so as I did not know what Kamathipura was. This all happened in my days of ignorance.

  Now I know.

  She made me watch some more of those terrible videos with women doing dirty things to men. It made me cry.

  When I cried she got even more angry.

  But then she went away and when she returned she was quiet and her voice was sweet and syrupy.

  ‘Only one thing is going to bring you to your senses,’ she said in that quiet sweet voice. ‘You must know what the alternative is. You must experience yourself how lucky you are, how very fortunate to be chosen by a man like Mr Chaudhuri. You must see where you will end up if you refuse to be compliant. That will help you to make a decision.’

  She moved me that very night.

  That is how I ended up in the cages of Kamathipura. It was all my fault, because I was not compliant. Compliant was a word I did not understand at first, because I had never heard it before. But I learned the meaning very quickly, and now I knew it. To be treated well I had to be compliant.

  Chapter 38

  Janiki

  I’m addicted, thought Janiki as she thankfully pressed the on button on Dr Ganotra’s computer. Away from the screen for too long and I develop withdrawal tendencies.

  But it was more than that, she knew. Asha was out there, somewhere, and Janiki believed with all her heart that all the information they needed to know was swirling out there in cyberspace; all she needed was the key to enter that space. Walking through Kamathipura this morning had been a complete waste of time; it had been for Caroline and Kamal’s benefit, as she had been there, done that already the day before. The obligatory tourist walk-through that left anyone more ingenuous in tears of distress. Caroline, indeed, had been near tears at the end.

  ‘How will we ever find Asha in that labyrinth?’ Caroline had asked her, tears welling in her eyes. ‘Janiki, it seems impossible!’

  ‘It’s not impossible at all,’ Janiki had said, thinking of the computer and her itchy fingers. ‘We just need a strategy. Come to the meeting this afternoon – we’ll share our ideas there. Go home and have a rest now – you look exhausted.’

  Caroline had nodded and stepped into the taxi Janiki hailed and negotiated for her.

  Caroline shouldn’t have come to Kamathipura, Janiki thought. She should have stayed in the luxury of the Taj and let us Indians find Asha. The shock of Kamathipura’s reality was too much for her. Americans are so oversensitive, she thought. They need conditions to be just right, and then they are strong; the moment outer circumstances go against the grain of their personality, they collapse into a heap. Caroline should have stayed in her pristine sheltered world and let us do the work. Kamal and me. Both just as desperate to find Asha as Caroline, but better equipped to deal with the squalor and the poverty and the ugly heaving throngs that is everyday India. We grew up here. We know. We are impervious, better equipped to hold our true inner selves separate from the ugliness without.

  And besides, thought Janiki, how on earth could a blonde white amber-eyed American be of any earthly help in the quest before them? Someone who couldn’t speak a word of an Indian language, a spoilt rich American who didn’t even know it was inappropriate to wear a diamond ring in a slum? Janiki shook her head. She’d have to have a word with Caroline. Persuade her to let her and Kamal do all the searching needed.

  Kamal. Janiki smiled as his name once again came to her mind.

  Yes, Kamal had changed. But so had she. He no more the older uncle, she no more the child – mature enough to care for his daughter, maybe, but still a child. He had been so austere, at first, so locked within himself, but she had found the key to his armour, and the key was Asha.

  It was as if their mutual quest had linked them together in some intangible way, beyond the attraction she had initially felt towards him. They were together, now, together in their desperation to find that lost daughter of India, together in their need to save her from whatever horrors she faced or – touch wood – had already been subjected to.

  ‘Dear God, let it not be too late,’ Janiki prayed now as she opened the web browser and tapped in the keyword to Mr Ramcharran’s email account. Let there be some clue, some sign, some hint as to her way forward. Hopefully Mr Ramcharran had not closed the account, had not changed the password…

  There. The account opened, along with a list of at least
thirty unopened mails. That meant that Mr Ramcharran was probably still in jail; hopefully he would stay there and be tried and spend the rest of his days in hell. For what he had done to Janiki, and most likely other girls like her. How could men do this thing? How could they? Did they not have daughters, sisters, mothers, wives? If I ever have a son, Janiki swore to herself, I will teach him this: treat every woman as you would wish your mother, sister, daughter to be treated. Let that be your guideline. Then you can do no wrong. Love and respect women as they deserve to be loved and respected. As human beings with lives of their own, and not as property to be used and abused. If only every mother would teach her son that golden rule!

  She scanned the list of mails, looking for a crumb of a clue. Something to work with. Something that would point her in the direction to be taken next. But the names of the senders, the subject titles all seemed innocuous. Just Hello! and What’s up? and Can you make it? Some in Tamil, some in English. Mostly from men, some from women. His sister was one of the first, before she knew of his arrest, apparently; reminding him of his niece’s tenth birthday and prompting him to visit, or at least call: you know how much Indira loves her favourite uncle! Such words now seemed ominous. Why was Mr Ramcharran a favourite uncle? Had he oozed himself into Indira’s favour, but with an ulterior motive? No, surely not. Not his own niece. Yet, to a man without morals, perhaps even a niece was fair play. Janiki shuddered. It didn’t bear thinking about.

  The personal messages were interspersed with several ads. Spam, it was called, Janiki had learned in America; spam, as in a kind of fake meat. She remembered suddenly that Caroline had craved spam when she had stayed with the Iyengars, when Asha was a baby. Funny, how an irrelevant memory can suddenly pop into the mind. She left the obvious spam messages and worked her way down the list, reading, then marking the messages as unread. Just in case. Covering her tracks. Obviously, she was even ahead of the police investigation in this respect at least. They didn’t have his password. One after the other she rejected the messages as useless. There was talk of a Lotus Pond. It sounded interesting. Was it a bar, a brothel? You need a password to get in, someone said. What is the password? I’d like to join. The first someone replied: The password is Dhuan. Smoke.